I think we can all agree, something has gone awry in the world. We continually see and experience evil everywhere. We, ourselves, perform evil acts, whether we lie, steal, hate or commit adultery (to name a few). Even without the Bible, we know, instinctively, these things are wrong. And because we know these things are wrong, we become a law to ourselves and our conscience bears witness. These wrongs that we commit are stored up and will one day be judged by the one God who has created and sustains everything. These wrongs are what the Bible calls "sin".
You see, our very nature rebels against God because every inclination we have is toward evil. And the main evil we have all committed is denying God as our Creator and King. We do this by doing the very things He told us not to do and by not doing the things He told us to do, it's rebellion.
Now, here is the problem, God is just and God is good. God cannot violate His attributes. He cannot do something that contradicts Himself and that is a good thing. It would be terrifying to know that this universe was created by an omnipotent evil god. So this presents a problem, if God is just and God is good, what does He do with people like us? We've sinned against God, we've sinned against one another, we've sinned against nature, we've sinned against everything. All of creation calls for our condemnation.
If God is truly just then what does He do with us? If a just God simply pardons the wicked, He is no longer just. If a holy God calls the wicked to Himself to have fellowship with them, He is no longer holy. So the great question is how does a just God pardon wicked men and still be just? How does a holy God call wicked men into fellowship with Him and still be holy? And the answer is found in the cross of Jesus the Messiah.
In the cross of Jesus the Messiah we see this tremendous, unique revelation of the fullness of God's attributes. God is just, He must condemn our sin. God is love, and so He becomes a man in His Son, lives a perfect life as a man, and then goes to a tree and on that tree the sins of His people are cast upon Him and all the justice of God, all the wrath of God that we deserve is thrown down on the head of Messiah. The exact measure that was required in order to fully satisfied that justice of God. After suffering Jesus said "it is finished." That meant He did what was required to satisfied God's justice against God's people. He paid the price in full.
This is so very important to understand; it wasn't that our sins were atoned for simply because the Romans beat Jesus up and nailed Him on a cross. Our sins were atoned for because on that tree He bore our sin and it pleased the Lord to crush Him. The wrath of God that should have fallen upon you and I, fell upon His only begotten Son. And He suffered it in full. He paid the price. He died, for the wages of sin is death and on the third day He rose again from the dead. And now He is seated at the right hand of God and there is no other name given to men whereby we might be saved except for the name of Jesus the Messiah. He is the way, the truth and the life. And no one comes to the Father except through Him. There is One God and One mediator between God and men - the man Jesus the Messiah.
And in order to be saved the Bible calls all men to repent of their sins and to believe the Gospel. Now what does it mean to repent? Many have defined the term as "to change one's mind", that's what the word means in Greek. And that truth is there. But it means so much more than what you and I can conceive in our culture today. You think well to change one's mind, that's pretty superficial. Well it might be but then it's not if you understand what the mind is. The mind in the Bible refers to the heart, will, emotions and intellect. It is the control center of a human being. And so what He saying is, if you have changed your mind, everything else will change with it. To repent, is to realize that all your thinking, your entire view about reality was wrong and then to see and to submit to God's truth about who He is, about who you are and about who Jesus is and what He's done for you.
Do you believe the Gospel of Jesus the Messiah and do you feel God calling you to repent? If you do, cry out to Him and confess your sins. He is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.